Policeman's Progress (4 page)

He gulped another beer, getting madder every moment.
She should be here, the bitch … she's due to sing in half an hour, anyway.

Perhaps she's persuaded Thor to take her straight home to her flat,
he suddenly thought – so that she could avoid his company.

He lurched to his feet and slouched to the phone. He rang her number, but got no reply. Throwing the receiver petulantly back into its cradle, he stumped out to the fridge to get another bottle.

On the way back, he put his eye to the peephole in the wall. Everything seemed to be going all right, though there were few patrons on this particular Sunday night. He had found – or rather, Thor had advised – that it was not worth keeping the
Mississippi
open on a Sunday, so Joe Blunt, who slept aboard as caretaker, usually had the night off to do his weekly pub crawl. As he took his eye away, there was a knocking on the outer door. He cursed, it couldn't be Laura; she had her own key. The banging continued, and in a rising foul temper, he went to answer it.

Joe Blunt stood there, muffled up to his squashed nose in a shapeless overcoat and hairy scarf, a flat cap pulled down to his crumpled ears.

‘What the hell do you want?'

Joe's voice penetrated the wrappings.

‘Got a bit 'o news 'bout Geordie.'

Jackie stood aside to let his old retainer in.

‘Bit bloody late to come bringing chit-chat, ain't it?'

Joe pulled off his coat and followed Jackie into the disordered room. He eyed the beer wistfully.

‘Get a glass, then – you know where they are.'

When he was refuelled, Joe began to talk.

‘Jus' now, I was in the Lambton Arms in Gallowgate. I was having a penn'orth in the lav, when I hears some fellers come in. They was a bit cut and jawing nineteen to the dozen – I could hear 'em under the door.'

‘Get to the bloody point!'

But Joe was launched into his story and like a runaway steamroller, nothing could shift him from his path.

‘One of 'em was saying as how he'd treat the others to another round of doubles – “flush, I am,” he says – “got a lovely little racket fiddling the tables with one o' Jackie's boys.” – “Oo's that then?” says another feller. “Geordie Armstrong,” says the first one'

Jackie Stott was all ears now. His head stuck out and his face got redder. ‘Who was it, Joe? Who the hell was it?' He was almost shouting.

Joe ground along imperturbably. ‘I couldn't recognize the voice, so I gets me gear on quick and nips after 'em. Had a job, mind, but I just gets a glimpse of 'em as they got back to the Select Bar.'

‘Who was it, man?' yelled Jackie, his patience gone.

‘Archie Lee – that little squirt that runs a barrow on the quayside of a Sunday morning.'

Jackie was feverishly doing up the top button of his shirt and pulling up his tie. ‘Archie Lee – I'll have his skin! But it's Geordie I want first. Didn't I tell you he was on the twist – didn't I?'

Joe bobbed his head owlishly, peering at Jackie who by now was pulling on his jacket.

‘What's all the rush then?'

The other man was halfway to the door.

‘Come on, man … where'll we find that sandy-headed bastard this time o' night? Some boozer or other; you should know which one.'

Joe trailed after him.

‘He'll likely be in the Cross Inn or the Berwick Arms,' he mumbled after his boss. ‘Them's his usual hang-outs, though he's been flashing it up in them smart hotels at the top end of town since he came into money.'

Stott hustled him out of the flat and slammed the door. He thundered down the stairs and got the Mercedes from his lock-up garage in the little court at the side of the club.

A moment later, they were racing through the streets, heedless of the speed limit, until a mere few hundred yards away the big white car pulled up with a jerk and Joe was hustled out at the bottom of Grainger Street to search the Cross Inn for signs of Armstrong.

‘Nah, 'e ain't there,' he reported a moment later. ‘Reckon he'll be in the Berwick.'

They rushed off again, this time towards the riverside. The Berwick Arms was only a short distance from the moorings of the
Mississippi
.

‘Hear anything else while you was in the bog?' demanded Jackie, as they hurtled down the steep street towards the Tyne.

‘Nah – only what I told you.'

‘Nothing about Laura?'

‘Nope, Archie Lee was only there a minute … what you going to do 'bout him?'

‘I'll fix him all right. I've seen him there a few times, playing the wheel, but I didn't connect him with Geordie. They wasn't proper mates, was they?'

‘Not as I know of – they couldn't have worked the fiddle if they was known to be buddies. Wonder how they did it?'

‘That's what we're going to find out – amongst other things,' snapped Jackie grimly. He went off into a string of curses which lasted almost until they pulled up outside the Berwick Arms.

‘Have a look in the public bar – I'll try the snug.'

Joe began to move away, then hesitated.

‘What if 'e's in there'

‘Drag the bugger out. What d'yer think?' snarled Jackie impatiently. He strode off toward the left-hand door, leading to the Lounge Bar and snug.

Stopping outside the lounge door, he stared in through the old-fashioned engraved glass panel. There was a fair crowd inside, in spite of the drab surroundings.

He turned and looked into the smaller private bar. Again there was no sign of Geordie and some sixth sense stopped him going inside to make sure. He made his way out and stood fuming on the deserted pavement.

He had started to walk towards the entrance to the public bar to see what luck Joe had had, when the swing-doors opened and a body shot out as if fired from a gun.

It was Armstrong, propelled by Joe Blunt's strong right arm. He rocketed across the slippery pavement and hit the side of the Mercedes, crumpling into a heap on the ground.

Without a word, Joe and Jackie closed in on him and flung him into the front seat. Joe slipped in alongside him and Stott ran around to the driving seat. Within thirty seconds they were rolling down the quayside, headed for the gambling boat.

‘What the 'ell do you think you're doing?' protested Geordie, as soon as he had got his breath back.

‘It's what we're
going
to do you want to worry about,' snarled Jackie.

Geordie, who knew full well what it was all about, sank into a terrified silence.

Further along the riverside, the warehouses thinned out and various small factories, waste ground and allotments lined the river's edge where Jackie's old torpedo boat lay moored.

The white car charged up to the end of the gangway.

Almost before it stopped, both front doors opened and a petrified Armstrong was dragged out by Joe Blunt.

Struggling feebly, he was frogmarched aboard and thrust into the office.

As a preliminary, Stott gave him an open-handed slap that nearly knocked a hole in his face. This was followed up by an encore of the blasphemies that Jackie had used earlier that evening. Joe stood impassively with his back to the closed door.

‘I don't know what you're gannin' on aboot,' whimpered Geordie, after the warm-up was completed. He was a dapper young man, about twenty-eight years old.
Typical ladies' man
, Jackie thought viciously, looking at his weak, pretty face.

Jackie grabbed Armstrong by the collar of his natty suit, pulled him forward until their noses were almost touching, then gave him a wicked short-arm jab in the stomach. Geordie went dead white and fainted, sagging like a bundle of rags in Jackie's hand. Impassively, he let him fall to the floor and waited for him to come around.

When he was conscious again, Stott began talking.

‘How d'yer do it, Geordie – what's the fiddle with Creeper Lee?'

He kept repeating this in a dull monotone until the younger man was able to start whispering feeble denials.

Jackie grabbed him by the collar again, and he capitulated.

‘Don't – I'll tell you.' Sobbing with mixed pain and fear, the story tumbled out. ‘I wasn't rooking you, honest, only the mugs. Archie would come and play, early in the evening usually, when not many were about. If nobody else was on the table, I would pay him out, whatever he'd staked on … if there were others in it, I'd slip him some counters every time I paid out. Then later, he'd split fifty-fifty with me.'

‘And how d'yer reckon that wasn't fiddling me?' roared Jackie.

‘That wheel has got a slight bias,' said Geordie tremulously, ‘very slight, but when you spin it as often as I do, you find out. I used to fiddle the mugs when business was brisk to make up for the bit that Archie and me raked off – so it wasn't no skin off your nose, Jackie,' he ended with a whine.

‘Like hell it wasn't, you little twister – that bias was still on my wheel. I should 'a been getting an even higher percentage.'

He clouted the baby-faced croupier across the face again and Geordie screamed with fright. But Jackie hadn't got down to real business by a long way.

‘Been flashing the money about a bit reckless, haven't you? How much you been spending on trying to roll my Laura?'

Geordie Armstrong looked at him, speechless with surprise. He'd been resigned to a beating over the money, but this was crazy! Another crashing blow to the point of his jaw bowled him over. He felt something crack in his face, but for some reason there was no pain, or he was too dazed for it to register.

He spat some teeth as he lay on the floor, and immediately collected another kick in the chest. Mercifully, he felt numb all over, though his mind seemed clear.

‘What the hell are you talking about?' he mumbled through his bloody lips.

‘You know fine what I mean, damn you,' raved Jackie, as he stood over the croupier. ‘My Laura, of course. You've been in her flat, haven't you! Trying your luck, eh – well, you pushed it a bit too far!'

‘Dunno what – you're on – about,' gasped Geordie.

Stott kicked him viciously in the ribs a few times, then hauled him to his feet with one great hand and rammed him back against the edge of the desk, supporting his sagging body with his fist.

‘Joe, go and make sure that door is closed up on deck – I canna remember shuttin' it. This lad is going to yell some, for I'm going to half-kill him now.'

When Joe came back down a few moments later, he found that Jackie had made an understatement.

Geordie Armstrong was dead.

‘He shuddnt 'a done it, Joe … he shuddnt 'a messed with my Laura!'

The two men stood looking down at the still body lying on the office floor. Both were hardened ex-fighters, with prison sentences for violence, but even they were shaken. There was all the difference between a beating-up, sadistic though it might be, and an actual killing.

‘I fetched him a right hook from off the floor. He went back and hit his head on the deck. Didn't move after that. What the hell are we going to do with him, Joe?'

Joe stared at the body with his bovine expression.

‘You overdone it, Jackie – you busted his neck.' He squatted down by the body and prodded it with professional interest. ‘His jaw's gone as well.'

‘What we going to do, I said!' snapped Jackie. He had no remorse or pity for Armstrong, only anxiety for his own skin.

‘It was manslaughter – you didn't mean to croak 'im,' growled Joe, trying to be helpful.

‘Ha! Do me a favour, Joe – if you think I'm going to dial nine-nine-nine and get the coppers in, you must be bloody barmy. Any fool can see he's had a duffing-up. The rozzers would die laughing – pinning a murder on me would send 'em all into hysterics.'

‘What we going to do, then?'

‘Didn't I jus' ask you that, you great sledge?' Stott paced up and down, slamming one fist into the other. ‘Did anybody know that Geordie came aboard with us tonight? I suppose half Newcastle saw you dragging him oot that pub!'

Joe shook his bull head earnestly. ‘Nah – I met him just outside the door, as he was coming out. Had a bit 'o argument with him, then flung him oot of the front door. Nobody saw us at all.'

Jackie breathed out his relief. ‘Thank God for that – it's a break for us.'

Joe might well have asked why ‘us' – he might be a party to grievous bodily harm but not to murder or manslaughter. But the old sparring partner was loyal. What was left of his brain, after its years of being rattled about inside his skull, contained a dog-like devotion to his protector. Without Jackie, he would have ended up in a criminal asylum – too thick to earn an honest living, he was even incapable of being a successful criminal on his own.

His mind slowly ground out the obvious solution to their dilemma. ‘We'll hev te dump him in the river, then.'

The club owner nodded slowly. ‘I only wish Thor could be in on this – that boy's got the best ideas on everything.'

‘Least who knows about this, the better,' grunted Joe, with a flash of common sense.

Jackie went to a cabinet and took out glasses and the ever-ready bottle of whisky. ‘Sure the damn door is locked?'

‘Ay – we got all night, no one will disturb us. Bloody good job we're closed tonight.'

They sat and had a few stiff drinks ‘to settle them' as Stott put it. He was uneducated, but had plenty of native wit. He considered the dumping of Geordie, saw the snags and as quickly thought of ways around them.

‘Must make sure he stays down a long time – then he'll be so bad if he ever comes up that no one will ever recognize him.'

‘What about his clobber – the coppers are clever these days,' grunted Joe.

‘Take it all off and dump it separate.'

‘Them copper laboratories can tell anything these days,' objected Joe – he had laboriously read an article in a recent Sunday newspaper on the subject and it had left a deep impression on his poor mind.